


Now that we've grown, we wander alone

by ClockworkRainbow



Category: Hollow Knight (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, because to properly convey the atmosphere of Hollow Knight, same universe as Refuse and Regret but they stand independently and do not need to be read together, you need to dispense all lore as anecdotally as possible
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-30
Updated: 2019-03-30
Packaged: 2019-12-26 22:42:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18291695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClockworkRainbow/pseuds/ClockworkRainbow
Summary: The Troupe Master makes a stop in a not-yet-doomed queendom, and tells a story to an attentive audience.





	Now that we've grown, we wander alone

            Furrow stood on the arid heights above Gildereign, a settlement mostly of scarabs and crickets that prided themselves, as small villages often did, on self-sufficiency and on knowing what was needed in the world.

            When the great crimson tents were pitched just outside of Furrow’s limitations, two weevils with painted masks resting in the shade of the village’s tiny spring, this caused a stir of unrest in Furrow’s residents; while they lay nearly outside of Gildereign’s borders, they shared the queendom’s skepticism of outsiders. Blinds were lowered over doorways and windows, children were pulled inside by their parents.

            And yet, it wasn’t long before that vigil relaxed. Part of it was a lack of descending catastrophe, but another was simple curiosity. These were strange bugs that toiled amongst the sands, their pale faces and the dark stripes painted along their masks, that gaudy, foreign scarlet carrying to their personal trappings, even their own hides to a degree.

            And they were not opposed to being watched, not a one of them. It was what performers were meant to be, after all, and this was not the first host of curious eyes that peered out at them. One of them even passed freely through the town, in the evenings when most of Furrow had settled to bed.

            He was tall for a foreigner, his head rising not straight up in pincers but sweeping back to an elegant crescent of horns, wrapped in a cloak both too short and too thick for this weather, and, yet, he did not seem to mind the heat at all.

            They noted his eyes, their beautiful color, a more vibrant red than anything else the troupe carried with them, so bright that one could imagine them flickering and shedding sparks in the gloom, but they were lifted, idly, regarding the sky as if waiting for something.

            This was an idle stop for Grimm. They might entertain, but they would not burn here. Oh, he could taste Gildereign’s decay on the wind that drifted up the canyon, but there was yet too much blood in its veins, even if that blood ran old and slow; the Lantern would not take root here to find fumbling tinder or arcane spark, traveler’s torch or any of a thousand other forces that had illuminated the path ahead for them in time.

            These people. He wondered how much time they had. What would bring their end. Which of them would survive, to flee in the lands beyond.

            He was caught in his thoughts, true, but not so much that he missed the poorly-hid footsteps beside him. The troupe master turned his head, bringing the illumination of his gaze to a pair of young faces. These were native people, scarabs- blue shelled, with white eyes.

            They stood in his shadow, the braver of the two comparatively tall and sturdy for their age. Their compatriot was tucked mostly behind them, peeping out from a gap in their arms.

            Gracefully, Grimm swept low, a reverent bow for the brave children. “How may I be of service?”

            The children were heartened by such somber acknowledgement from an adult, even at the raspy crackle of a voice that escaped an elegant face. At the same time, they seemed at a certain loss for what to demand when they were at such freedom to choose. The leading one, older, mustered themselves first. “You’re a carnival bug, right?”

            The black-streaked eyes crinkled in amusement. “I am indeed.”

            The younger child was coaxed out of hiding, his voice if not his body. “What do you do? Do you dance with scary beasts? Do you swing from ropes? Do you juggle swords, or eat fire?” Each new prospect seemed to thrill him a bit more.

            “I do a few of those things,” he said, to the excitement of both children, “but it is late, and this is not an adequate stage. But,” he said, as they wilted in disappointment, “Perhaps I could do something else, if you would like to see an act right now.”

            They brightened, glanced between each other with eager noises. The older child made a show of being discerning. “…What kind of act?”

            “Would you like me to tell you a story?”

            The younger child scurried to find somewhere to sit right away. The older looked a bit disappointed, but, settled themselves on a shell container. It was a fine audience, albeit a small one, and the troupe master paced fluidly to stand before them.

            “What is the difference between a light and a flame?”

            A cautious pause. “One’s bright and the other’s hot?” the younger child guessed.

            “Oh, but a flame can burn brightly, and a light can shed warmth, can it not?”

            The older child was quick to grow cross. “Then aren’t they the same?”

            “Not quite. There was a truth to the first answer. A light, by its nature, will always shine; it may shine very much, or very little, but if it were not at all bright, it would not be a light. It can _have_ warmth, but it does not need that to define itself. Likewise, a flame does not need to prove itself by the light it casts.”

            “Another question: what separates a dream and a nightmare?”

            The older child snorted. “That’s easy. One is good, and one is bad.”

            “Are they?” Grimm tilted his head, thoroughly enjoying himself.

            “…What’s good about a nightmare?” The younger child asked this- a genuine question, not a dismissive sneer.

            “You are interested in carnivals, are you not, dear children?” This was met with agreement. “Yet, if you attended one, you might see something gruesome. A bug entombing themselves in dangerous confines, or letting another throw nails and pins at them. Or dangling high above a pit of fire on a single thread. Yet crowds flock to see these things. Are they not horrors?”

            “But they’re safe.”

            “And a nightmare- that, too, is safe. You awaken in your nest, warm and sheltered, parents and siblings close at hand. Contrariwise, dreams can prove precarious even at their most appealing. Many a sensible creature is led astray by strange notions, their own, or others fed softly into their mind. We seldom think to fight that which presents itself so beautifully.”

            The younger child looked very thoughtful. The elder was fidgeting on the spot. “These are just riddles! None of those are a story!”

            Grimm blinked, wide-eyed, as if the thought had merely just occurred to him. “Of course. You will excuse me. Let us see. What is a proper way to begin a story?”

            The younger child would not be deterred by his older compatriot’s irritation. He bounced in place delightedly, claws scratching on his knees. “Oh! ‘Once upon a time, there was a beautiful castle,’”

            The troupe master wore a relieved smile on the false exterior of his face. “An excellent overture indeed. Once upon a time…”

            “Once upon a time, there were a brother and a sister who loved each other very much. They had never been apart, from the day they were born. They were fortunate children, with many gifts and talents, adored by those around them.”

            “The sister was bright, and beautiful, and courageous. She shimmered when she danced, and glowed when she fought. She drove back any shadow, no matter how deep it was- it could never touch her. Such strength and nobility she had.”

            “The brother was warm, and loved to speak. His voice flickered all through the kingdom, and found people as they slept. He surrounded himself, always, with other people, and was preoccupied with finding new things to show them and tell them about.”

            “And these beautiful siblings, dear children, spoke a terrible lie unto each other.”

            An appropriate pause from his audience. “What was the lie?”

            “Why, that they would never leave each other. That they would always stand by each others’ side, always love each other, that anything they ever faced, they would face together.”

            “That doesn’t sound terrible,” the older said firmly. “Isn’t that a good thing?”

            “Love can be a good thing, yes. But not without understanding. These siblings, dear children, they seemed very similar, but only on the surface. At the end of it, they were not the same.”

            The younger child seemed to think this over. “Like a light and a flame?” He guessed.

            Something flickered in Grimm’s eyes. “ _Exactly_ like a light and a flame. But each believed, earnestly, the other was just like them. To the sister, they were two lights, perfectly matched. To the brother, they were two flames. His sister merely needed some help remembering to be warm, and he did love to help, to illuminate, to guide others. While to her, he was weak, and dim, and needed to be reminded how to shine- because so much of his light was lost to warmth instead. And she loved to care for others, to show them the right way.”

            “So they lied to each other, every day, quietly, around the edges of conversations, they lied to each other and they lied to themselves, when they talked about the future, when they planned what structures to build, even when they spoke to strangers. They lied in the way of people who didn’t even know they were lying, because they wanted it to be true so badly. What a terrifying world these siblings lived in. How badly they wanted to feel that they were never alone, that they would always be understood, that they would always be happy.”

            “And so it was inevitable that tragedy would strike them.”

            “It came one day they were walking together near the village they had built. The brother was fond of the villagers, and stepped away from his sister to greet them. While they were talking, one of the youths of the village fell off of the cliff. They were so young and so small they hadn’t learned how to fly yet, and they struck the rocks and died.”

            “They had seen death before, the brother and sister, but never so close, and so personally. The brother was inconsolable. He didn’t leave them, not when the villagers carried their body away, not when they were being prepared for a funeral. Days passed as they waited for the ground to thaw, and in all that time, the brother did not stop weeping. He wept until the tears cut scars across his face, darker and darker and darker, and was still crying.”

            “But why was he so sad?” The younger child sat up. “Why then, and not the other times before? And why would he cry so much to hurt himself?”

            “A good question.” A breath of arid wind stirred the lanterns in their fixtures, caused the lights to play strangely across Grimm’s streaked visage. “Perhaps it was something about the timing. Perhaps he knew that youth more than he knew the enemies he had cut down on battlefields, or the elders that had passed away while they slept. Perhaps it was just how shocking, and sudden it was, to lose someone who he thought had so much time left.”

            “The sister was a good sister, and she did not want to see her brother cry any longer. So, while she usually stayed away from the village, she stormed into the temple one day, where the body of the youth lay. She gathered a great fistful of her light, and poured it into the body, and when the youth sat up again, she took them outside to show the whole village what she had done.”

            The older child was incredulous. “She brought them back to life? She could do that?”

            The younger, more concerned. “…Did it make her brother happy again?”

            “Oh no, dear children. Once something is gone, it can’t be returned the same way it left. The youth was standing, and moving, was very alive, true, but something essential of them was missing for the process. And seeing this, the brother wept even more, and fled the village, far into the wastelands, until his sister couldn’t see him any longer.”

            “At first, he simply pitied himself, and the youth; a tragedy, to have died so young, but tragedy greater to be robbed of that death. If they had been buried, returned to the ground and allowed to decompose, that made a possibility they would come back. They would never be the same, of course, but some piece of them, something they left behind, would have one day breathed new air. But what his sister had done, they would never die, but merely remain there, at that moment when their body struck the rocks. No progress could be made. No future there.”

            “Then pity became rage, at what was taken, and the brother burned across the sand. He burned until his tears and his anger and everything else became fire, and those flames burnt themselves out in the thin air at the edges of worlds. And then, stopping to consider his work, he realized something important: he was not weeping any longer.”

            “Was he happy?”

            “He was not, but he was tired. All of the embers he had scattered still held warmth in them. But they were not fire any more- just seeds, that might be plucked by the wind, carried to new places. They might create new flames the likes of which he himself had never seen. The way that the youth’s body would have created something new, if it had been allowed to become dust in its time. And while he was tired, he was not sad any longer, and could think calmly.”

            “The problem, he decided, was that his sister did not understand death. She could not accept it. He might weep, but she raged. He had wept knowing the anger that burned inside of her, not only for how it had affected him, but for how it had affected the youth. Why else would she have stormed through the village in such fury? She despised that such a thing had happened to one of the people they had made together.”

            “They had made the villagers? Were they gods, this brother and sister?”

            Again, Grimm smiled. “Yes, they were gods of a sort. Not like the Queens down in your canyon, that rule the thunder and rain, but others.”

            The older child took issue with that. “Nana says they are no gods besides the Queens. The Queens made the world, and everywhere beyond them is fake. The heat mirages from the desert make it seem like light is there.”

            “But the carnival bug came across the desert, right? And he’s real, or he wouldn’t be telling us a story.”

            The older child pushed the younger, a little sharply. “You’re silly, Ogrim!”

            The younger shuffled a bit. “But Enga, he _did_ come from across the desert.”

            “That I did. Whether or not I am real, that is up to you, but there are certainly kingdoms beyond this one. Some of which,” he added, looking at the younger child, “have beautiful castles.”

            Evidently the older child did not think highly of Grimm filling their brother’s head with these sorts of notions. “Get back to the story, carnival bug.”

            Grimm bowed grandly. “Of course. Where was I?”

            “The brother thought his sister didn’t understand death.”

            “Quite right.” He had not, incidentally, forgotten where he was. “So, he stayed in the wastes for many days, and in that time, his sister, who had stayed behind, got angrier. She still believed that this was about the dead youth. She declared, from then on, no one would ever die again. She would raise them all, as she did the youth. The living and the dreaming would walk side by side, unbroken, forever.”

            “Then her brother returned to her. He returned, walking across the wastes, with a tear-scarred face and clear eyes, carrying a handful of embers.”

            “She came down to meet him, quickly, excited to show him what she had done. That she had vanquished death, that his sorrows had ended. But the more they traveled, the more uneasy she became. For her brother, who had always been one of such passion, watched everything calmly, and did not respond to any of it. He saw everything she wanted to show him, and, still, his face had not changed, he had not spoken a word to her.”

            “Then, in a whisper, he said that there was something he wanted to show her as well. His voice was nearly gone, and she could barely hear him.”

            He thought he caught a glimmer in the younger child’s eye. But the child sat obediently, claws still resting on his knees, waiting for the conclusion to the story.

            “Together, they walked around the edge of the village, around the mountain, as they once had, as they had not for a very long time. The living and the dreaming stood at the edge of the village, together, watching them with glowing eyes.”

            “The brother opened his hand, and among the embers, there lay his own heart. It blew away in the wind, and his body fell, down from the cliff, struck the rocks and broke.”

            A sudden gasp from the younger child; the older looked angry. “Why? Why would he do that?”

            “He wanted her to understand,” the younger child said softly.

            “Precisely.”

            “The sister ordered the villagers to gather up the body, to lay it in the temple. She herself went flying, chasing the heart across the sky, but it had burned up with the embers. She couldn’t find it. Without it, there was a hole in the brother’s chest; no light would rekindle him. She could not make him dream like the others.”

            “Years passed. The body stayed in the temple. The sister could not make it dream. She tried to keep it, but eventually, a drowsy acolyte dropped a candle, and the entire temple burned down. There was nothing left of the body but ashes. The sister punished the acolyte terribly, but she could not execute them, because she had decreed that no one would die. Instead, she chased them to the edge of the village. And the next one who questioned her, and the next one besides that. Out into the wastes, one after another, the ones that she couldn’t stand.”

            “Then, one day, the winds blew, and the brother’s heart came back with the wind. He walked underneath it, young and strange, spoke in an accent of another land, but he told his sister that he had come home.”

            “She was angry with him. She wanted to know how he had left, why he had pretended to die. He told her, ‘sister, I do not mean to trouble you, but I did not pretend. That would be cruel. I truly died, and now I have come back.’”

            “‘For how long?’ she wanted to know.”

            “‘I do not know,’ he said, ‘until I must die again.’”

            “The sister told him, ‘then I will save you.’”

            The younger child lifted his head. “…But she couldn’t. She couldn’t save him last time. He didn’t want her to.”

            Grimm’s eyes were warm. “You are very wise, dear child. The brother did not want to leave his sister alone. But he did want her to understand, and to be able to let go. As he had not understood death until it was the youth, he thought, perhaps she would not understand death, until it was him. So in the wastes, he had devised a way to die.”

            “He only meant to die once, but, having done so, and come back, he found that he knew more things than he had before. He had truly become something else, something new, who could see the world a different way. And doing that, he knew, that someday he would have to die again, because the new thing he had become would grow old in time, and that would be something else, exciting and promising.”

            “But the sister, this sort of change was angering. She hated it. And there on the outskirts of the village, for the first time in their lives, they fought.”

            Now even the older child was looking concerned. “What happened?”

            “Neither knew the limit of the other’s strength. They had never contested each other, after all. The brother was swift, but the sister was unrelenting. Eventually…”

            The younger child had lifted his claws to his mouth. “…No,” he said softly.

            “Eventually, the sister defeated him, and flung him down the slopes of the mountain. She realized, then, how weak he was, because he had become a child, because he had taken his heart out of his body, that soon he would die again, just like he told her. She was so angry that she turned her back on him, and climbed back up to the village.”

            “And the brother? Well. She had made herself clear. So once again, he drifted, away on the winds.”

            The older child had tears in their eyes. “What kind of story is that, carnival bug?! That’s sad!”

            “Perhaps. But they both got what they wanted. The brother wanted to understand death, and so, he left, and he would go on, living, and dying, and becoming new things. The sister wanted to never change, and so, she did not.”

            “…But,” the younger child lifted his head. “But you don’t think that she ever regretted it? That she ever got lonely? If she’d never been alone like that…”

            And for a time, the troupe master was silent.

            After a moment, he dipped his head. “Perhaps. That is a part of the story that I do not know. Perhaps, someday, if you were to travel yourself, you would hear the other half of it.”

            A voice called, across the town, and the two children hopped to their feet, calling back in response, hurrying onward. Grimm remained where he was, regarding as the two slowed to a walk, talking to each other. The older shoved the younger, once, but not very hard.

            He looked to the darkened east, stepping beyond the limits of the small town.

            He wondered.


End file.
